It's Not A Joke
by brookiecookie831
Summary: Conner's not a bully. He just likes to joke around. But even he have to admits that he took things to far this time. Not to mention that Trent's been acting weirder than usual. Conner doesn't know what's going on with his brother, but he's gonna find out. Trent and Conner brother AU. WARNING: Mentions bullying and suicide. Oneshot


**A/N: Hey guys! This is an idea that popped into my head after watching a short film on bullying called** ** _Bullying-Stop It_** **. It's a great video and I highly recommend watching it. This is a little drabbly oneshot based off of that film. however, please be advised that it does deal with bullying and mentions of suicide so if you have issues with either of those subjects do not read this story or watch that video! You have been warned! This is kind of AU since Trent and Conner are brothers in this, but it's mostly the same besides that. There are rangers in this (except for Trent), I just chose not to really talk much if at all about that and I hope that's alright.**

 **Summery: Conner's never thought of himself as a bully, he just likes to joke around. It's not his fault some girl can't handle a joke. Although, even conner has to admit that he took it a little bit to far this time. But on top of all of that, Trent has been acting weirder than usual and tends to ignore his phone every time it dings. Conner doesn't know what's going on with his brother, but he does know that he doesn't like it. Not one bit.**

 **Really hope you guys like this and please feel free to leave a comment!**

 **Warnings: Mentions of bullying and suicide, language.**

 **It's Not A Joke**

"Trent let's go!" Conner yelled out the window of his car. "Mom needs the car." Conner saw his brother coming and looked down to fumble with the radio but looked up when something out the passenger window caught his eye.

A group of guys had just pushed past Trent, snickering. One of them muttered "Freak." barely loud enough for Conner to hear, but more than loud enough for Trent to pick up on it. Conner frowned, but didn't say anything as Trent slipped into the passenger seat of the car. He just pulled out of his spot in front of the school and started driving home.

Trent's phone dinged and he looked down at the message he just received, sighed, than tucked his phone away in his bag. Conner saw this, and frowned a little more.

"You okay?" He asked. His brother just kept staring straight ahead, not looking at him.

"I'm fine." Trent said. Conner didn't believe him, but let the subject drop.

"Hey, I'm going to a church event at the elderly home tonight with Ethan and Kira. You wanna come?" Conner asked, glancing at Trent. Trent just shrugged his shoulders. Conner sighed and neither one of them said anything as Conner pulled into their driveway and they both jumped out of the car.

"Mom, we're home!" Conner called as he and Trent walked in, placing the keys on the small hutch in the hallway. "

"Keys are on the hutch!"

"Okay honey! Have fun at your event! Your dad is gonna leave you his car when he gets home so you boys will have a car while we're gone!" Their mother called from downstairs. She and their dad were driving down to Florida to visit one of their grandparents who was recently released from the hospital for a few days to make sure they were all right. Which meant the boys would be alone for a few days and Conner would be in charge.

"I'm gonna start walking to the retirement home." Conner said to Trent, who was already walking up the stairs to his room.

"Are you coming?" Conner asked, annoyed. Trent didn't even look back as he answered.

"No I have homework." He said as he disappeared upstairs. Conner just huffed.

"Fine. I'll be home later." He said. "And don't drink all the juice!"

...

"Hello? Earth to Conner!" Kira said, waving her hand in front of Conner's face.

"What?" Conner asked and Kira just rolled her eyes.

"It's been your turn for like, five minutes." She responded and Ethan nodded.

"Yeah man. What's up with you? You look troubled. And not normal, ranger type troubled." Ethan said the last part in a low voice so no one else could hear. Conner sighed, rubbing his eyes with one hand."

"It's my little brother." Conner responded and Ethan raised an eyebrow.

"Trent? What about him?"

"I don't know." Conner said, placing a card down on the pile. "He just seems different lately. More withdrawn. Distant. I mean, Trent was never much of a talker, but lately he's been as quiet as a mouse." Kira and Ethan now had the same thoughtful, troubled look on their faces that Conner had on his.

"Have you tried talking to him?" Kira asked, and conner nodded.

"Yeah, multiple times." Conner said. "He'll respond, but he kind of just shuts me down. I don't know what to really do." Conner sighed again, but perked up when he saw one of his soccer friends, Damian, playing cards with an elderly man at a nearby table.

"I'll be back guys." He said, getting up to go see Damian just as a nurse came and told the gentleman it was time to go back to his room.

"Hey man." Conner said, sitting down next to Damian. Damian grinned at his friend.

"Hey Conner." He said, giving Conner a high five. "What's up?" Conner didn't get a chance to answer before a girl named Eliza came up to their table.

"Aren't you the one that made that meme about Lauren?" She asked and Damian looked down at his cards. Clearly uncomfortable.

"I don't know." He said. "Maybe." Eliza crossed her arms.

"That was pretty mean." She crossed her arms and Damian just rolled his eyes.

"You made her cry during English." She said, trying to get Damian to see what he had done wrong. Damian just got agitated.

"Whatever!" He said, throwing his cards on the table. "It was a joke. Sorry if I didn't know some chick couldn't handle a joke!" Conner avoided eye contact with Eliza when she turned and looked at him.

"It's not a joke." She said. "It's you hurting someone." And with that, she walked away.

Conner apologized to Damian and then went back over to Ethan and Kira, looking even more troubled then before.

The girl Eliza had been talking about was Lauren Mathews. She was in Conner's History class and one day he saw Damian take a picture of her and show it to him. He and his friends had laughed about the face Lauren had been making in the picture and Damian had later turned it into a meme with the words, "I don't always look in the mirror, but when I do.." above Lauren's picture. The meme had spread around school like wild fire and Conner and his friends had printed it out once and taped the paper copy to Lauren's locker. Conner felt sick to his stomach now, knowing that Lauren had taken the joke to heart and even cried over it. Conner then thought back on how strange Trent had been acting lately and the way he avoided looking at his phone when conner or anyone else was with him. Conner didn't even see Trent drawing or sketching as much as he usually did. A fact that sent even more alarm bells off in Conner's brain.

Conner sighed as he sat back down in his seat. One way or another, he was going to find out what was happening with his little brother.

...

Conner opened the door to his house and walked in.

"Trent?" He called up the stairs. Receiving no answer, Conner walked into the kitchen and opened the fridge.

"Thanks for drinking all the juice." He said, annoyed. Still not getting a response from Trent, Conner turned on the kitchen light and was slightly taken aback by what he saw when light filled the room.

A cup of juice sat on the counter next to a sandwich that was on a plate. Conner picked up the note next to it and read:

 _To Conner.  
Wasn't sure what time you'd be home. Made you dinner  
Love,  
Trent._

Conner took the note with him and went upstairs to Trent's room.

"Trent?" He questioned, turning on the light in his brother's room. Trent's bed was made and hadn't been slept in, his phone lay on top of the covers. Plenty of Trent's artwork was taped on the walls and his easel sat in one corner of his room with his other painting supplies. One picture on Trent's desk caught Conner's eye and he picked it up to get a better look at it.

It was a picture of Conner as the Red Ranger.

At first, Conner panicked a little. Thinking that his brother knew his secret. But than he turned the picture over and was able to calm down.

 _I know Conner's not the actual Red Power Ranger._ The note on the back read. _But Conner's always been my hero. It just fits to think of him as a hero to the world too._

Conner's heart swelled as he placed the picture back down on Trent's desk, turning to leave and go find his brother. But before Conner even reached the doorway, Trent's phone dinged. Conner turned around and walked over to Trent's bed, picking up his phone.

Conner knew he shouldn't. Knew Trent would kill him for looking at his text messages. But something was going on with his brother and whatever it was had to do with his phone.

Conner scrolled through a conversation between Trent and an unknown number, frowning the entire time. Whoever this person was had been sending Trent awful messages. Some were simple and just said words like "Freak" "Loner" and "Loser". Others were more vicious. Conner stopped midway through the conversation, looking at a text Trent had sent from earlier that evening that merely said "Leave me alone." But the unknown person didn't miss a beat.

"U R alone." The message read. "If I were a loser like you I'd kill myself." Conner's blood froze and his heart missed a beat. It all made sense now. But then something else registered in his brain.

Someone had told Trent to kill himself earlier today, and now Conner couldn't find him.

"Trent!" Conner yelled, running down the stairs. He looked through the house, continuing to call his brother's name, before he stopped back in the kitchen. Conner tapped his phone in his hand, thinking about what he should do. Without thinking much more about it, Conner started to dial 911. But just as he was about to type in the last one, he heard what sounded like crying coming from the back porch.

Peeking out the shudders, Conner leto out a huge sigh of relief. Opening the door, Conner walked out onto the porch where Trent sat on the swing.

"Hey." Conner said, but Trent didn't respond or even look at his older brother Conner sighed as he sat down next to Trent.

"I uh, I looked through your phone." Conner admitted. Trent still didn't say anything.

"Trent," Conner looked up from the phone to his brother. "who wrote that?" Trent looked at the ground but decided to answer this time.

"I dunno." He said, voice barely above a whisper. "Doesn't matter. They're right." Conner felt his heart break as he wrapped his arms around his brother and pulled him closer. Something he hadn't done since they were kids.

"No Trent, they're not." He said. "They just don't know the real you." Conner continued as Trent slipped back into his silence. "Maybe they were just joking around?" He questioned, thinking back to Damian, Lauren, and the meme. Trent pulled away from his brother, upset.

"You're just like them." Trent said, hurt by Conner's ignorance. Conner looked hurt by Trent's statement, but realized he was right. Conner was a bully, he'd hurt another human being. He made them cry. Conner thought back to Lauren. He wondered if she had any older siblings. If she hid the fact that someone was bullying her from them the same way Trent hid that he was being bullied from Conner.

"You're right." Conner said, slightly amused at the shocked expression that came over Trent's face. Conner gave him a small grin.

"I'm an idiot." He said, eliciting a laugh from his brother. This time, Conner genuinely smiled. "And I'm sorry." He said sincerely. Trent offered him a small smile.

"Thanks." He said, scooting closer to his older brother. "I love you idiot." This time it was Conner's turn to laugh as the two got up to head inside.

"Love you too Gremlin." He said, ruffling Trent's hair as they walked into the kitchen.

...

Conner stood by his locker as he put some of his books back and waited for Kira and Ethan. Trent had already left to go to work at Haley's Cyber Cafe, but Conner had secretly watched him leave and had already made plans with Kira and Ethan to go to the Cafe after school. Now that Conner knew what was going on, he was determined to find whoever was bullying his little brother.

As Conner waited he saw some of his soccer friends tape another paper copy of the Lauren meme to Lauren's locker, then walk away laughing. Conner felt guilt swell in his chest as Lauren walked to her locker and saw it. he felt even worse when he saw the tears start to fall down her cheeks.

His phone buzzing in his back pocket caught Conner's attention as he pulled it out to read the text he just got.

 _Hey bro,_ It began. _Just wanted to say thanks for listening last night. I'll see you later._

Conner looked up from his message at Lauren, and started to walk towards her locker.

Without much thought, Conner tore the paper off of Lauren's locker door, crumpled it up, and threw it away. Lauren looked up at him, confused.

"I'm so sorry." Conner began. "i never should have let my friends post that. It was totally uncool and uncalled for. And I'm really, REALLY sorry." Conner said, switching his backpack strap from his right shoulder to his left. Lauren had surprisingly stopped crying and, even more surprisingly, smiled.

"Thank you." She said, surprising Conner. "not many guys would have the balls to say all that." Conner chuckled.

"Does that make me special?" He asked cheekily and Lauren grinned.

"Sure. But not for the reasons you think." She joked and Conner laughed.

"hey listen." He said. "A few of my friends and I are going to Haley's Cyber Cafe, do you maybe wanna come." Lauren's eyes lit up at the offer and she immediately accepted. Conner smiled as he and Lauren walked over to his locker and were soon met by Kira and Ethan. Kira and Ethan immediately took to Lauren after Lauren told Kira she had heard her sing once, and that Kira had an amazing voice. And when Ethan started talking about a new computer game, and Lauren didn't roll her eyes like Kira and Conner.

Conner smiled as he walked into the Cafe and saw his brother. He was mad at himself for the fact that it took having to find out Trent was being harassed by someone for him to realize that what he and his friends did to Lauren wasn't a joke, but hurtful and not okay. But at the same time, he was grateful because he was now able to realize that he had hurt someone and he was able to fix it and apologize for it before the problem escalated and got worse.

Now all he had to do was find out who was messing with his brother and scare the crap out of them.

And if the power rangers made an appearance and decided to help...well, Dr. Oliver never needed to find out.

 **And that's the end of this oneshot. I really hope you guys like this and please feel free to PM me or leave a comment. I'm all for constructive criticism, just no flames please. Have a lovely rest of your day everyone!**


End file.
